SETBACKS AND RESPECTING THE ILLNESS

This piece was not dated.  It must have been written some time ago as it is very faded and was somewhat hard to read.  I'm so glad I have it though as it really demonstrates how much effort we have to put into giving up sabotage and substituting Dr. Low's thinking for our own.  

As I read it, I thought of how hard Mom had to work at overcoming her symptoms and suffering.  I have no memory of her displaying any of this around me.  She always said that since she had been so sensitive as a child and could see that I was too, she was careful to protect me.  Well, that said, I'm sure there were some things I was aware of even if on a little conscious level.  I was about one when Mom saw Dr. Low, so I did benefit greatly from her inner work.  In my eyes (and others), she became the personification of serenity.  As I've said before, she shared so much with me and was a tremendous help when I needed it.  If you are having a difficult time pulling out of a setback right now or dealing with some symptoms, I hope her humility and wisdom she shares here will help you too. 

This is what she wrote.

After I had been in Recovery for several years I had a major setback.  I had been enjoying a reasonable amount of relief from my symptoms, although I had had setbacks too, of course.  One of the most encouraging things to me was that I seemed to be losing my panics, and although I had many times of extreme discomfort, I still moved my muscles and didn’t particularly worry about it but looked upon it as average.  I was quite contented with my progress in Recovery.

            One morning, the minute I opened my eyes, I became conscious of a severe feeling of anxiety.  I began to wonder what had brought that on.  Later on in the day I found that I couldn’t shake the feeling no matter how hard I tried to practice Recovery.  I had a feeling of foreboding as though something terrible was about to happen.  This went on for several days.  I developed a sick feeling in my stomach, tightness in the chest and head.  My thinking seemed to be very confused.  I noticed that I was sweating and sometimes felt as though I had a temperature – and then again I would feel very chilly, and my hands would be like ice.  I took my temperature but it was normal.  My throat seemed to lose its rhythm for swallowing, so eating became an ordeal and even swallowing my saliva would sometimes make me choke and cough.  I tried and tried to spot what was causing this, but nothing seemed to help me.  I couldn’t break through the symptoms and my thoughts.  I began to really worry because I realized that I had not been without symptoms now for over a week, and had even awakened in the night with a feeling of terror.  It began to dawn on me that I was in a setback.

            Even this thought that I was in a setback seemed strange to me too.  I thought that I might get a feeling of relief to know that I was in it, but gradually instead of feeling more secure I began to feel utterly lost.  I grasped at the idea of the meetings.  Maybe I would feel better after I had talked with the members and could finally get some Recovery into my head that way.  I did feel a little more secure while I was with them, even though my symptoms were with me all the time, but what a disappointment – that a short time after I left them I would feel hopeless again.  I think this is one of the worst feelings in the world.  Not only do the symptoms cling to you like a cloak surrounding you, but also they are inside of you permeating every fiber of your body and mind.

            I became very self-conscious about my performance.  I seemed to drop things and stumble and bump into things easily.  I dropped a full bottle of milk one morning and I thought for sure that my mind was gone, because I couldn’t direct my hands to hang on to the bottle of milk.  My housework looked like a gigantic task; in fact it seemed impossible for me to do.  It was as though everything I had to do in life was piled in front of me and I couldn’t do it.

            My children began to be a great irritation.  The little average things that children do would either send me into a rage or I would say to myself, “What’s the use?  I haven’t the energy or the brains to raise these children.  I haven’t any experience and just don’t have what it takes to live an ordinary life. Others have, but I haven’t.”

            Then I had a period of seeming to be in a vacuum when I just sat in a chair or lay on the bed, and it was as though my thinking had stopped.  I felt as though I were in a stupor.  I don’t think others even realized it, because I did what I could to look normal.  The feeling of unreality was very strong.  People, even my own family looked strange and unreal to me.

            I felt angry with everyone, but at the same time I had a great feeling of being unworthy.  I kept thinking it was too bad my husband wasn’t married to someone else.  This other person I felt could take my place so much better.  I always pictured her as being pretty and smart.  She would be smiling and serene and her house would be in apple-pie order.  She would play with the kids and have them under perfect control because they would love her so.  She would plan so many things for their fun, and I could just see her fooling around with them and being such a darling with my husband and children.  (I know now this is what I thought I should be – and what high standards, eh?)

            In the face of this type of thinking, my own performance sure looked hopeless to me.  My house was a mess.  I was depressed and moody, and I was in and out of temper all the time.  I had temper tantrums with my son and he and I would go around in a sullen mood for hours and days at a time.  I kept my husband in a constant state of apprehension towards me, for fear he might say or do something that would “hurt” me.  I tried to “freeze” everyone else out of my life, including my husband and children.

            Well, I guess this is enough description.  It is even painful for me to recall that I was ever like that.  I don’t remember how long this went on, but after a good long time I finally began to grasp at straws of Recovery practice.  I think it was the intense suffering that I got sick of and it actually forced me to grab for anything that might help me.  All this time I had been attending my own meetings.  I recited the principles, and even told others how to practice, but none of it had registered with me.  I finally began to realize that no miracle was going to happen and that I would have to start using the method of Recovery to help nature restore me to balance, if I was going to lose the suffering.

            I remember very well what it was I first used to help myself get out of the setback.  I read in the book where Dr. Low said that patients say they will do ANYTHING to get well.  But he said that we don’t want to do the one thing he asks, and that is to exchange our own view of insecurity for his view of security.  So I began to force myself to take a more hopeful attitude.  Then I endorsed myself for doing it.  I reasoned too that anyone who thinks he is hopeless isn’t going to feel very well, in fact is going to feel pretty miserable about it.  By the same token, anyone who thinks he will eventually feel better and get better is going to feel at least more hopeful, so he will have a chance to get over feelings of depression.  At first it seemed to me that I was trying to fool myself, but again I read that Dr. Low says that to cling to the view that our case is hopeless, is a harmful view and that it is our abiding sense of insecurity that makes us choose and cling to this view.

            After a little practice with this one thing, using my Will to Believe what I was trying to think.  I began to notice a little bit of clearness in my thinking.  I was able to begin spotting on the small irritations and frustrations again.  Then I realized again that I had accepted all my “feelings as facts” and had been in a severe “working up” process without realizing it.  It took tremendous effort sometimes to act secure with my muscles, talk secure, and hardest of all to think secure.  I clung with tenacity to the thought that I was average.  Perhaps I was poor average in many respects, but that didn’t mean that I didn’t have the intelligence and the ability to improve on my performance in time.  At present, I would have to accept myself as I was, and WAIT until I learned to become the person I would like to be (with average standards of course).  I could learn to put effort into life without becoming discouraged.  Otherwise I would live in constant fear and anger, with symptoms to boot.

            This particular setback sure was a wonderful experience that has helped me so much in maintaining good mental health.  It made me respect my illness.  It made me realize that keeping well is a serious business.  It helped me to develop a wariness in spotting and stopping my temperamental reactions to outer and inner environment.  I must reject with trigger velocity the suggestions of insecurity that come to me, either from without or within.

            I don’t mean that I didn’t have setbacks after that, but I sure did remember the painful experience of being mired and bogged down with helplessness.  And I learned when I started into a set-back I could actually limit it to a few days or perhaps a week or so by being quick to spot and reject beliefs of insecurity, as though they were poison for me.  And I learned to move my muscles and act and talk and think as though I didn’t have the insecurity.  Then by WAITING I found that nature took care of this brief flare-up of my old illness.

            Last of all, I am predisposed to the thought that I may still have to experience the setback although I haven’t had one in years and years.  The last one I had lasted three days and was very mild.  But to me it is realistic to be expecting it, so I will remember and know what to do about it.  

Moving the Muscles

When I was growing up and especially when I was probably in middle school, I'd inwardly roll my eyes when Mom would say, "Dr. Low told me..." or, "Dr. Low says..."  But of course, later on I learned to pay attention. First I paid attention out of intellectual interest, later to help friends, and then out of a need to recover from my own suffering!  Thank goodness I had that background as I really knew when I was in the grip of my symptoms, that I might be helpless but it didn't mean I was hopeless.  That kept me going as I started to REALLY practice (there's nothing like pain to get me motivated) and wait the Recovery way for the balance to come.

The note I found in one of Mom's journals is about moving muscles.  It's so basic.  I remember Mom telling me this and when I read it, I thought it would be good to share it with you.  It's true that sometimes I forget that moving the muscles and then endorsing myself has much to do with practice, practice, practice!  It is by this (and more) that I go from being "symptom-led" to "self-led" and with self leadership I gain self-respect.  This is what she wrote:

Dr. Low told me that many members misinterpreted the principle “Move your Muscles”.  He said, “They’ll say, ‘I moved my muscles and scrubbed the floor.’  Well this is not what I had in mind at all.”

We were interrupted in our conversation at this point and I never did get the opportunity to query him on it.  However, I think I have figured it out – or at least I have a guess as to what he meant.

Our society is very “production” oriented.  Moving my muscles and scrubbing the floor may give me a feeling of accomplishment.  I may feel more worthy, and may even feel more acceptable as a person.  This may temporarily give me a lift, a bit more energy, but is this what Dr. Low meant by this principle?

In contrast, I’ll cite the case of my nervous fatigue that debilitated me to almost a stand still (lying in bed, not bathing often, etc.).  I learned from Recovery that I should move my muscles to take walks every day and to try to increase the distance gradually.  I’m not exaggerating when I say that I felt I didn’t have the energy to walk from the front door of our home to the sidewalk, but I moved my muscles to go ahead and walk – not in a weak, hanging back timid way, but with a bold vigorous step.  The dizziness came, the world outside me swam in a blurry, unreal way, but on I walked, striding out for several blocks.

By the time I returned from my walk, I would feel no better – in fact I might feel worse because of the severe discomfort my walk had brought on.  Nevertheless the principle of taking walks, was the practice I had accepted, so next day, out I went again.

There were times on these walks that I would feel I might have to lean against a building or a tree – or possibly drop down and crawl home somehow.  Trembling and sweating I would go in our house and wonder when I would begin to get some results.

My nervous fatigue kept on for a long time – or it would leave for a short time and come back.  But somehow with persistence there was a cumulative effect that finally emerged.

“Move your muscles” was the Method.  What did it do? My muscles proved to my brain that my fatigue was not organic but psychological.  The mere act of walking physically was not the issue.  The issue was that my brain was convinced that I could not function as other people do.  Moving muscles was not an act worthy of praise from others – but it was a means of dealing with the psychopathology of my illness. 

Self Endorsement

It seems like one of the hardest things for me to remember is to endorse myself for my effort. I remember Mom remarking over and over how important it is.   Endorsement encompasses a lot. Effort refers to many things.  I will post one aspect of this and what Mom had  to say about it later.  It was more about "moving the muscles", but still it's about effort.  I ran across the following in her journal.  It was a short note, but worthy of repeating for myself and perhaps for you too.

Low to Me-

You have not fully controlled your temper (fearful mainly) until you have endorsed yourself for it.  Self-endorsement fortifies the growing belief that control is called for, desirable, and that it reaches a standard in your own table of evaluations regardless of how others may regard your behavior.  With endorsement for your effort to control you add to your coming conviction that the [temperamental] judgment of yourself and/or others is not a plus in your life – but a real minus.  We are conditioned to think there is a standard that calls for retribution, or winning a victory.  Endorsement says, “It is good for me to win a victory over my own temper